


When It Crumbles

by writewithurheart



Category: Captain Marvel (2019), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/F, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Major character death - Freeform, Missing Scene, No Endgame Spoilers, Post-Captain Marvel, Pre-Mid Credit Scene, Spoilers for Captain Marvel, Stand Back Up, bridge between end scene of Captain Marvel and Endgame
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-12
Updated: 2019-04-24
Packaged: 2019-11-15 21:30:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18081248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writewithurheart/pseuds/writewithurheart
Summary: She’s in the middle of evacuating yet another group of Thanos survivors when her communicator goes off with the message from Fury’s enhanced pager.





	1. Chapter 1

She’s in the middle of evacuating yet another group of Thanos survivors when her communicator goes off with the message from Fury’s enhanced pager. She’s closer than she’s been to Earth in a while. She passes the child in her arms off to Talos as he herds the adults into the transport ship.  There are smaller and smaller pockets now. She was following in Thanos’s path of destruction, helping the survivors.

This group had been Asgardians, already nearly extinct before Thanos took a shot at them. 

Rumor has it -recently confirmed by the survivors here - that Thanos is after the Infinity Stones. So she’s not surprised by the call. She’s been on C-53 recently enough to know that Fury has his own brigade of heroes, ones supposedly strong enough to defend the planet. She and Maria had laughed their asses off at the name. 

She still chuckles when she hears the name Avengers. She can’t even face someone who calls themselves an avenger. It was almost enough to get her to contact Fury after twelve years and ask what he was thinking. Almost. 

According to Fury, they were enough to guard the Tesseract. According to the Asgardians, Thanos almost had a full set. Time was running out. 

“What is it?” 

Carol holds her wrist out to Maria as she stops at her side. Maria frowns at the message. “Guess this means we’re headed home.” 

“We knew it would happen sooner or later.” 

Maria sighs and runs her hand over the ring on Carol’s left hand, the one that matches her own. They’d finally tied the knot when Monica joined up with the U.S. Airforce and had practically shoved them together, telling them to get with the times. It’d been a small ceremony. Just Monica, Fury, Talos and his family. They’d spent their honeymoon out in the galaxy and then it just seemed natural to stay. 

Twelve years after leaving the second time, Carol and Maria decided to start their life together out in the vast openness of space as a sort of disaster relief team, travelling from planet to planet rescuing survivors and protecting the innocent. The Earth had new heroes to defend it. Maria’s mutant gene was starting to slow her aging noticeably. She hated to leave Monica on planet by herself, but Monica declared it gave her something to live up to: that one day, instead of them coming back, she would meet them on the moon. 

Monica. Carol curses.

“Have you heard from Trouble?” Carol asks suddenly. She dismisses Fury’s beacon and checks for others. If something so terrible was happening then Monica should have checked in too… 

“Carol. Baby. Something’s happening…” 

Carol turns and her heart stops. Maria’s hands, raised in front of her face are starting to fracture. Like an old screen breaking off into pixels, they’re crumbling. For a beat, that’s all Carol can see: her wife disappearing in front of her. Then her heart jumps back into motion and time speeds up again. 

Her hands grab Maria’s, but it’s like grabbing at sand: there and substantial and then crumbling the next. “Oh God, what’s happening?

Carol’s hands finally find purchase on Maria’s face and her heart is scooped right from her chest at the love and fear in Maria’s eyes. “Baby-” 

“No. No no no. This can’t be happening. I won’t let it-” Her hands start to glow. Nothing too powerful that would hurt Maria, but Carol has to do something. And maybe her power can force her atoms back into place. 

“We know what this is,” Maria says, conviction in her voice. 

“Thanos,” Carol says suddenly. Her voice takes on a hard edge. Finally. Someone she can punch. Someone who has long deserved her ire. “He has the stones.” 

Maria is falling apart in her hands, but the only thing remaining in her eyes is love. “You can fix this, baby. Stop Thanos, bring me back.” 

Carol snorts. “You always had so much faith in me.” She presses her forehead to Maria’s, tears leaking down her face. 

“I love you.” Maria moves then, pressing her lips to Carol and moving straight past chaste and firmly into dirty territory before the crumbles completely into emptiness and Carol breaks. 

She collapses to the floor, tears streaming down her face, whispering a steady stream of ‘I love you’s to the woman who just disappeared from her arms. In the back of her mind, she processes Talos giving her space, the awkward distance of others giving her a moment to her grief. Carol is tired and weary. She fought this fight for so long. She trusted Fury to protect the pieces. 

“Captain-” 

Carol feels the mantle of the title settle on her shoulders. It’s a reminder. And the voice in her head that sounds a hell of a lot like Maria says:  _ You are Carol “Avenger” Danvers. Captain Marvel. And when you fall down, you get the fuck back up. _

She rises slowly and turns to face Talos. “Take these people to safety. I’m going to find Thanos.” 

Talos nods and moves back to the full ship. Everyone follows, but two figures. Carol frowns at their uniforms of green and white, tattered and bloody. She stares them down as they stare back at her. There’s a pause as she waits from them to speak. When they don’t, she nods to the full vessel. 

“Better hop on or you’ll get left behind.” 

The woman steps forward, face grim. “You’re going after Thanos.” 

“We want in.” The man steps up beside her, a spear forming in his hand. 

Carol sizes them up before setting off to her own ship. “Fine. Let’s see if you can keep up.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be perfectly honest, I'm not all that sure what this is, but here's part 2 before Endgame is released.

**Part 2**

“Where is Fury?”

She lost her wife, crossed a fucking galaxy, and Fury isn’t even the one on the other end of the pager. Her green passenger - who apparently goes by Loki - refused to enter the building for reasons unknown. She heard a mutter about green and hulk. Valkyrie laughed. She’s currently down the hall, covering their escape, but C-53 seems oddly empty. 

It appears all that’s left of the famed Avengers are standing in front of her: a bearded Captain America, a small blonde Black Widow, a doddering science type and a familiar face. She frowns at the final member. 

“Rhodey?” 

He blinks in surprise. She was a woman in the air force and he was a black man. They floated in the same circles before he went off and started being besties with Tony Stark, who’s logo is all over this damn tower. Seems like something that arrogant genius would do. “Danvers?” 

Any other day, she might smile and pull him into a hug. But today was not any other day. She lost Maria to Thanos’s twisted idea of how the universe should be, and she only just got in contact with Monica. There’s too much grief for happy reunions. “So you’re part of this circus? Thought you knew better than that, Colonel.” 

Her eyes drift over to Captain America who’s puffed up like he’s in charge. 

“So, who’s going to answer the question? Where’s Fury?” 

The good captain crosses his arms over his chest, finding his courage. “And who the hell are you?” 

“The original Avenger. Now. Fury?” 

None of the people in the room look pleased with her answer. “The original…” 

Most people in the room look over at Captain America, trying to figure out what she’s talking about. Rhodey is staring at her. “I thought you were dead.” 

“Not dead. Contact with aliens.” She lets out a short, controlled breath. “Now, I’ve had the love of my life disappear in front of my eyes and an emergency beacon went out, so someone please answer the damn question: Where. Is. Fury.” 

More looks, exchanged in silence that grates on her nerves and fuels her annoyance. 

“He disappeared, along with half the world’s population.” The widow. 

Carol nods and looks around the room. “Thanos?” 

The anxiety speaks for itself. They have no idea where he is. Carol clenches and unclenches her fists as she focus on keeping her power contained. She walks away from them as she tries to think. “He has all the stones?” 

“Yes, ma’am. We were unable to stop him and we haven’t been able to find him since Wakanda.” Captain America steps forward. “Since we’ve answered your questions, how about you answer some of ours, ma’am?” 

She pauses and turns back to the leftover Avengers. “My name is Carol Danvers. Pilot.” 

That elicits various reactions throughout the crowd but Captain America doesn’t move. “It’s been some time, but to my knowledge civilians don’t wear uniforms.” 

Carol smirks at that. “Well, Captain America, my team started calling me Captain Marvel. Guess that makes us both Captains.” 

“And how do you know Nick?” The blonde asks. 

“Who’s Nick?” 

“Fury.” 

Carol frowns at the other woman. “You’re Black Widow, right? Nat-something?” 

She nods. 

“And you call Fury Nick?” Carol asks slowly. It doesn’t connect in her head. There are nods around the room and she shakes her head. “And he lets you?” 

“He doesn’t have much of a choice,” the scientist mutters. 

Carol taps on a screen as she moves closer. “He once told me his children would call him Fury.” She snorts. “Then again he also turned into a mush when he met a cat.” 

“A cat?” 

“Mush?” 

“Fury?” 

She allows herself a small smirk as she sifts through their computer screens. So she can still surprise them. She turns back with a thought. “Did you find his cat?” 

“Cat?”

“Goose.” Her words clearly confuse. The other blonde look annoyed that she doesn’t understand, as if she’s not used to the situation. 

“My friends! I have fortuitous news! My friends have arrived.” 

Carol glances over her shoulder at the newcomer: blonde, buff, one mismatched eye. In his shadow walks Valkyrie. So he must be the Asguardian. She pushes off the console and walks up to him with her arms crossed. She raises an eyebrow but doesn’t look at Val. She heard tales of Thor between Loki and Val’s constant bickering. 

He’s clearly a warrior. Despite the ‘dumb jock’ stereotype Loki claimed, Carol can see the warrior’s intelligence that lurks under the surface. There’s a certain amount of posturing, of inane alpha male-ness, but unlike all the men she met in the Air Force, Thor isn’t staring her down like she’s lesser. No, he looks at her as a warrior, an assessing gaze laced with respect that was missing with the first three humans she met. 

Instead of speaking, Thor lifts his hand. Carol doesn’t move as air is displaced millimeters from her head. Thor crosses his arms around the axe now in his hands. Carol’s lips quirk in the start of a smile at the approval in his eyes. Thor glances around the room. 

“I like her.” 

Val smirks. “Me too.” She winks at Carol before continuing into the room and the obvious bar at the other side of the room. “I hear they’ve got alcohol around here somewhere.” 

Carol twists to look back at the leftover heroes. “Is this all that’s left?” 

The heroes exchange looks before Captain America take it on himself to answer. “As far as we know. We lost contact with Tony and the kid. They were last seen on a spaceship heading out of orbit.” 

“And Terrans haven’t cracked the secret to intergalactic travel,” Carol concludes, pulling up her wrist display. They’ve been keeping tags on all Thanos ships so a last location shouldn’t be too hard. “First things first: find status on Ironman. Then Thanos.” 

Thor nods. Widow glances at Steve Rogers. “Who says we’re following you?” 

She glances around. “Any of you have a space ship?” 

“No. But I have a rainbow bridge.” Thor grins. 

Carol nods. “Good. We’ll split up. We’re taking this fight to Thanos. You and Val get Goose and then go to these coordinates. The rest of you: with me. Let’s go find your wayward teammates and kick some purple ass.”


End file.
